From AudioFile
Five perfectly ordinary women living in the same district are murdered; Maigret sets a trap using his fellow police officers. It's often said that one reads Maigret for Maigret, not for the story. That being the case, Sachs has struck just the right note for this aging and weary police inspector. The chief problem here is that there isn't much variation in the minor characters, making it difficult to differentiate among them or to figure out who's speaking. However, Sachs handles the narrative very well. He says proper names in a French accent in deference to the Paris setting, and his briskly clipped tone handles them easily. His pacing is steady, reflecting the matter-of-fact tone of police procedures. S.F. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


Book Description
It is a hot and steamy summer, and Maigret is hatching a plan to capture a serial murderer by playing on the killer's perverse vanity. He finally succeeds when an important clue leads him to a trio of suspects. But the three are entangled in a web of guilt and possessiveness so tight that the unraveling nearly exhausts the Inspector--until, at last, he discovers the tortured motives behind the murders.

Maigret is a registered trademark of the Estate of Georges Simenon.



Language Notes
Text: English, French (translation)


From the Publisher
5 1-hour cassettes


From the Back Cover
"Marvellously evoke[s] the sounds, the smells,
the colour and the raucous life of European bars,
ports and cities."-P. D . JAMES


IT I S A H OT and steamy summer, and Maigret is hatching a plan to capture
a serial murderer by playing on the killer's perverse vanity. He finally
succeeds when an important clue leads him to a trio of suspects. But the
three are entangled in a web of guilt and possessiveness so tight that the
unraveling nearly exhausts the Inspector-until, at last, he discovers the tortured
motives behind the murders.

"Captivating."-T H E N E W YO R K T I M E S B O O K RE V I E W

G E O R G E S S I M E N O N (1903-1989) was born in Liège, Belgium. He published his
first novel at seventeen and went on to write more than two hundred novels, becoming
one of the world's most prolific and bestselling authors. His books have sold more
than 500 million copies and have been translated into fifty languages.



About the Author
Georges Simenon (1903-1989) was born in Liège, Belgium. He published his first novel at seventeen and went on to write more than two hundred novels, becoming one of the world's most prolific and bestselling authors. His books have sold more than 500 million copies and have been translated into fifty languages.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

It is a hot and steamy summer, and Maigret is hatching a plan to capture a serial murderer by playing on the killer's perverse vanity. He finally succeeds when an important clue leads him to a trio of suspects. But the three are entangled in a web of guilt and possessiveness so tight that the unraveling nearly exhausts the Inspector--until, at last, he discovers the tortured motives behind the murders.

Maigret is a registered trademark of the Estate of Georges Simenon.

SYNOPSIS

It is a hot and steamy summer, and Maigret is hatching a plan to capture a serial murderer by playing on the killer's perverse vanity. He finally succeeds when an important clue leads him to a trio of suspects. But the three are entangled in a web of guilt and possessiveness so tight that the unraveling nearly exhausts the Inspector--until, at last, he discovers the tortured motives behind the murders.

FROM THE CRITICS

AudioFile

The hunt for a serial killer has become such a convention of today's crime fiction that it's almost surprising to find it treated as a fresh subject in this tense, cat-and-mouse detective thriller, written in the mid-1950s. It's a hot August in Paris, and Inspector Maigret is setting a trap for "the Montmartre killer," who in the past six months has killed five women on deserted streets—suddenly, leaving no witnesses, following no apparent pattern or motive. Simenon, famous in his lifetime as a master of compression and plot structure, adapts perfectly to audio; his prose is already abridged, his pace is brisk and compact, but rich in atmospheric detail. And Sachs's reading is a marvel: subtle and precise, he changes effortlessly from voice to voice, keeping pace with a story that relies heavily on dialogue. One forgets his Madame Maigret is not a woman, and forgets that he is not Maigret himself. D.A.W. Winner of AUDIOFILE Earphones Award ￯﾿ﾽ AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine

AudioFile - Sue Feder